This blog post is especially aimed at one group of people: international applicants.
This growing group of aspiring college students has a unique group of challenges when applying to American schools. The fact that there are challenges does not mean that international students should give up in despair. It merely means that planning needs to begin earlier and students need to be prepared for a rigorous, and occasionally frustrating, application process. For example, one of my recent clients spent days trying to get his high school transcript translated by several different companies, because different universities required different translation services.
Here are some of the most common pitfalls that make American college applications challenging for international students:
1. Language
Unless you happen to be from Ireland, Canada, the UK, or one of the other English-speaking countries in the world, chances are that English is your second, or third language. Because of this, the TOEFL examination takes on oversized importance. Indeed, there is a certain extent to which TOEFL results are, for non-English speakers, more important than SATs or even grades. I have worked with many students who have gotten accepted to schools that an American would likely never have been accepted into with similar SAT scores, merely on the strength of a TOEFL. Similarly, students who fail to excel on the TOEFL often fail to get into the best programs, even if their other grades and test scores are perfect. The reason for this is simple: colleges want to know that students not only read English, but that they can speak it fluently and write coherently.
At some point, I’m likely to write an entire blog on the TOEFL itself, but for now, it is sufficient to say that I cannot stress how important it is in the admissions process.
2. Finances
American universities are astronomically expensive, particularly when compared to colleges in the rest of the world. There are many reasons for this, but students applying to American schools who are not American citizens must almost always prove that their family has the means necessary to afford a college education. For some schools, this means that parents need to provide a bank statement demonstrating more than $100,000 in savings. Unlike American students, international students are not generally qualified for financial aid, and are entirely barred from grants from the American government. There are some countries that provide very good aid to students studying in America, like Saudi Arabia, and there are scholarships available at many schools for international students. But, ultimately, finances may prove to be the biggest hurdle facing international students.
3. Different Educational Values
This huge challenge should not be underestimated. There are many areas of the globe which emphasize memorization of content, rather than independent thought. This can be very helpful in some areas, like pre-med programs where students are expected to remember massive amounts of information (like the names of all the bones of the body), but can also create huge problems in areas like composition and the social sciences where there is a greater emphasis on critical thinking. Similarly, I have worked with many international students who have struggled to understand American standards when it comes to plagiarism, or who do not know how to write an essay that expresses an opinion. Different educational systems in the world prepare students in vastly different ways, and it can be difficult to move from one system into another. Students applying to American schools need to be aware of these differences not only because they will affect applications, but also because they will affect future success.
4. Name Recognition
Relying too much on name recognition when applying to schools is another common problem among international students. I once had a student who was accepted into a very competitive program at the University of Rochester, currently ranked 34th by US News and World Report. His parents would only allow him to attend a top-25 university, and had not heard about Rochester, despite the fact that it was a much better fit for him than other schools. Ultimately, he ended up somewhere else, and eventually dropped out and moved back to his home country, because he was so miserable. Name recognition is important, but it is the not only thing which one should consider when looking at colleges. It is especially important for international students to consider a wide variety of factors in considering where to apply, because it is often the case that they will have to accept a spot at a university without even visiting it first.
5. Quotas
At the risk of entering a political debate, quotas make international admissions very challenging as well. For example, generally speaking, it is much harder for a student from Asia to be accepted to an American university on the West Coast than the East Coast, because so many more Asian students apply to universities in California, for example, that an applicant who might otherwise be qualified might be rejected simply because he or she is not quite as good as other applicants from the same country, and the school is worried about accepting too many students from one place. International applicants often have to apply to far more schools than Americans because the admissions process is far less predictable.
I usually end these blogs with a reminder that I am available for a free half-hour session if students and families have questions, but here I will make a more direct plug: if you are an international student looking for someone to guide you through the complexities of American applications, please do reach out to me. I have vast experience with helping students from all over the world with applications, and will be very happy to help you get started in the right direction.
I believe that, for many students, an American education is well-worth facing these difficulties, but that makes it incredibly important for such applicants to find the right counselor to assist them, because trying to do everything on their own might prove exceedingly difficult.
Mr. K
Y O U M I G H T A L S O L I K E :
Learn more about these three different categories of colleges that you should aim to apply to and why they are so important.